Carpet Bagger

The following people are dead to me: People who ask if we have socks to rent at work. I have a number of issues with this. First: EWWWW. Okay, I can understand people who are kinda grossed out by the idea of bowling shoes. Even though we are meticulous about spraying shoes between uses, the idea of community shoes is just too much for some people. But socks? Seriously?

I suppose the theory is that we would launder socks after each use, but let's break it down. We charge a dollar a pair, a little high for a "rental fee" but a good unit price. But how many pairs would we have to rent before we got enough to do a single load of sock laundry? Also, what if someone tried to walk out with our socks? With shoes it is worth it to chase someone because those go for as much as 40 a pair.

Anyway, that's not what the crux of this post is about. While the sock thing was the later bookend to my day at work, the early bookend dealt with carpet samples and the future of the walls of the lanes. We've been working with two potential ideas for the new wall carpeting.

Idea One: The Glow Bowling Wall. With this design, the bottom half of the wall would have a black background and a blue/orange cross-hair motif. There would be a thin stripe of orange separating the bottom half from the top, which would be a blue similar to the one in the pattern.
Pros: Will look great during glow bowling.
Cons: Will look hideous/ridiculous the other 90% of the time.


Idea Two: The Oberlin Wall. Our school colors are Crimson and Gold, and the pattern would be half and half, with a swoop towards the end of the lanes.
Pros: School spirit and will hide dirt better than the Glow wall.
Cons: The swatches may turn into something severe in greater quantities.

Tom asked for my opinion, and I couldn't come up with a good answer. When we discussed it a couple of weeks ago I was okay with the Oberlin wall at first but the more I thought about it, the more I realized we would be rivaling the set of the $25,000 Pyramid:

Looking at the swatches today, the Glow wall may rival the set of the $10,000 Pyramid:



I'm hoping the next round of swatches ease my concerns. Otherwise, I may have to start building a winner's circle. Here is your first subject: "Things on your Feet"